[CHAPTER XLV.]
RETRIBUTION.
When Frederick Holdfast turned the key in the lock, Pelham raised his head, and looked in alarm at Mrs. Holdfast. She, also, hearing the sound, slightly raised herself from the bed upon which she was reclining and looked into Pelham’s face. Dazed with fear, they remained thus, transfixed, gazing at each other, and did not speak for full a minute. Then Pelham, with his finger on his lips, looked upward to the ceiling, in the supposition that the sound had proceeded from above. For full another minute neither of them moved.
“Did you hear anything?” asked Pelham, in a whisper. “Speak low.”
“Yes,” she replied, trembling with fear.
“What do you think it was?”
“God knows,” said the terrified woman. “You told me no person was in the house.”